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We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

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Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#281

Post by cup-of-tea »

HumanDrivenDev wrote: post #147
cup-of-tea wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wonder if all these sour grapes about cars will simmer down if a generation comes along that can more easily afford them again. In the UK you could afford a car on minimum wage. I have a car. I still don't think cities should be designed for cars. How can anyone look at one of those pictures of American five-lane highways of bumper-to-bumper traffic and think that is in any way sane?

> In the UK you could afford a car on minimum wage. Parent said easily afford, not afford.

What does easily mean? Not even notice the extra expenditure on the car? When was that ever the case for most people? It's always been a big outgoing, second only to housing.

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#282

Post by mac01021 »

chrisdhoover wrote: post #203
ingsoc79 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mass transit is a viable solution to people only when it's more convenient than cars. When the hassle of driving and finding parking is less than the extra walk/transfers/etc of taking transit, most people will drive. If you have mobility issues or have cargo you need to haul back, you're even more likely to drive. Here in Seattle our roads are at capacity and the city is actively working to increase density, creatin…

It is important to split mass transit from public transit. I ride mass transit everyday but am vilified for it since it is private.

??? What transit is this? Commercial airline?

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#283

Post by jaredklewis »

AcerbicZero wrote: post #130

It seems this discussion comes up fairly often, and the solution is almost always some variation of "make driving too expensive and/or too inconvenient, to force people to use public transit". On the surface that kind of makes sense, using a large stick to strongly encourage change, but I think at its core it misses a huge portion of the problem, which is that bad public transit is 10x worse than just sitting in a bi…

What's interesting is that I don't think any of the problems you describe with mass transit are inherit to or really even related to mass transit. I think they are just our cultural problems, spilling over into public spaces, such as mass transit.

For example, in Japan there are many less homeless people on the buses and trains. No surprise there though, as there are very few homeless people in Japan. Even in Tokyo there only about 0.1 per 100k, compared with 795 per 100k in San Francisco.

If someone is in a car, that does naturally insulate them from the homeless people, though it certainly does nothing to alleviate the root problem of there being a lot of homeless people.

If our homeless epidemic is so bad that it is ruining our public parks, transit, and sidewalks, one would hope fixing it would become a political priority. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be much political will in the US these days to take on big, difficult issues. :/

Also, just curious, where did you see the strategy of cracking down on public transit behavior that was effective?

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#284

Post by woolvalley »

peterwwillis wrote: post #166
btingle wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do I look like, mother Theresa? It's not my job to solve the city's homelessness problem. Do you mean to say that politicians/public officials/etc should be dealing with the problem?

No, I'm saying citizens should solve the problem. And I know it's not your job. It's nobody's job. That's why nothing has been done. I mean, the stupidest thing about this is this isn't that hard a problem to solve. Homeless people are just regular people with a problem and no resources to fix it. You provide them resources and help and they are no longer homeless and no longer a nuisance. Instead, people see them li…

It is actually many people's full time job to 'solve the problem'. Homeless services in SF alone get funding in terms of billions of dollars, which pay many full time jobs. On top non-profits which get private donations.

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#285

Post by techsin101 »

I'd share my perspective...

old cities were the best.

i visited some european cities and some middle eastern cities.

there are main roads where traffic is, and then there are streets.

Streets are NOT made of cement, softer the material the easier to walk on ... Dirt? the best.

Streets can sprawl 4 blocks in US city size.

Streets don't have any traffic, but cars can be parked here and there randomly. (car ownership is less)

What it did was that grocery, laundry, hardware store, restaurants, and pretty much everything was in walking distance... you didn't need a car. and there were no cars to get in your way.

But with 5 minutes of walking you could easily be next to highway and hail a taxi.

All that time I was there, I was like OOOMG this make soooo much sense, I dont need to drive 4 miles to some mega shopping mall to do shopping then come back find parking for 30 minutes.

Oh and nobody was fat. Since everyone did light walking daily. people were less stressed as there was culture and less stress.

I don't get why every street needs to have a freaking car in it.

from nyc btw.

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#286

Post by coldtea »

wrycoder wrote: post #162
coldtea wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you have a small town, then cars are a better option than transit. In a large metropolis, transit is better. Were did that came from? In a small town, you can get by fine with walking, bikes and so on -- like tons of Europeans do in tons of small (and even larger) towns, including towns where cars are totally forbidden and others were (because the town was built in medieval times and its buildings still stand ju…

I live in a New Hampshire city of about 10,000. I'm about three miles out of town, too far to walk regularly. You should try biking downtown in January in the snow, slush, and wind! I don't see anyone biking with shopping bags, even in the summer. We bike for recreation. We've made our choices. There used to be a railroad that came up from Boston and deadheaded here. It went out of business, was revived, and failed a…

>I live in a New Hampshire city of about 10,000. I'm about three miles out of town, too far to walk regularly.

We (parents and us) used to live about 4 miles out of my hometown. One can always bike or use the regular public transport (bus e.g.).

But if you live 6 miles outside a city you can also drive there. What we were discussing was about not building the city itself around car traffic -- not not connecting it to the rest of the area / country.

>I don't see anyone biking with shopping bags, even in the summer. We bike for recreation. We've made our choices.

Well, that's a choice.

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#287

Post by coldtea »

scythe wrote: post #154
coldtea wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However, most people (US) would not prefer to live in such a town. Citation needed. Most people in the US were never given the chance to live in such a town (all other things being equal, like them being able to afford to live there). And there's also the cultural conditioning. Besides, there are rich areas in the US too, with little to no cars and lotsa walking and jogging, and people go live there just fine, payi…

>Citation needed. There is no need for a citation for such a claim. It is well within the boundaries of my personal experience. I live in America, I have known lots of people, and I've become familiar with what they want. >And there's also the cultural conditioning. People should only be conditioned to live the ways you want them to, of course. It's only "cultural conditioning" when you don't like it.

>People should only be conditioned to live the ways you want them to, of course. It's only "cultural conditioning" when you don't like it.

Or you know, conditioning can go either way, and a society should decide what's better (including for the environment) and push for one or the other.

Suburban sprawl, wastelands designed around traffic, obese citizens who seldom walk anywhere, no urban center for communities to meat, and unfriendly crime ridden cities don't seem to work that well...

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#288

Post by TelmoMenezes »

mac01021 wrote: post #276
mrep wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That and the war on drugs...

I'm no fonder of the war on drugs than anyone else. It promotes violent crime and places an enormous burden on the state. But how does it cause there to be more homeless addicts?

In several ways.

- It is very likely that drugs are more addictive when you are uncertain about obtaining your next fix. http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comic/rat-park/

- The criminalization of drug addicts turns them into an excluded class. They find it harder to get jobs or even to stay out of jail. If they start young -- and many will, once the problem becomes generational -- they are prevented from developing certain life skills and successfully develop their personality into adulthood.

- If drugs are criminalized, people will be afraid to ask for help.

- The war on drugs guarantees an unregulated black market for drugs. This means there will be no quality controls. Drugs are laced with all sorts of things that can be much worse than the pure version of the substance.

- Being arrested for something that harms nobody instills a distrust on society that, many times, never goes away. Imagine being sent to prison for years for smoking cannabis. Your life ruined. It doesn't take a lot of empathy to see how one would never trust society and its institutions again.

- The solution for addiction is, many times, other drugs. For example methadone for opiate addicts, and Ibogaine -- which appears to be a miracle cure for many addictions, but that is Schedule I in the US (and by consequence in many other countries). The war on drugs is based on pseudo-science and fear.

These are not just a bunch of hypothesis. They have been empirically confirmed by a nation-wide, multi-decade trial in Portugal.

Policy-makers that ignore all of this are not driven by the desire to help people. They have other incentives and/or irrational biases.

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#289

Post by batteryhorse »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #268
icanhackit wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Trains are much more pleasant to ride compared to Melbourne. Sydneysider here. I didn't realise the trains were bad in Melbourne. I travel to Melbourne regularly but rely on cabs when my legs won't suffice i.e. to/from the domestic airport. The MEL CBD is very walkable thanks to being a grid. Do you think trains are more affordable in Melbourne, thus a good option for the homeless? I can't figure out what the diffe…

GP here. I don't think that trains are bad in Melbourne, although I haven't been to Sydney to compare, it's the buses and trams that have the anti-social behaviour. Having cops at all the train stations at night definitely helps keep the trains in a better state. Affordability doesn't factor in at all here. The people who cause trouble on public transport don't pay for public transport. I'm not sure what it's like in…

When Melbourne made all trams free in the city centre, trams became unbearable to ride. It used to be just one tram line that was always filled up, now it's every single tram as soon as you get to the free zone.

The transport system was better before Myki in my opinion. More affordable, weekly passes, and paper tickets. In contrast, Sydney's transport used to be a mess with every operator requiring a different ticket, so no transfers from train to bus or ferry. Now with Opal, everything is much simpler, and the best part is going to the airport is really cheap now, if you let your Opal card go negative :)

Re: We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars (2016)

#290

Post by YeGoblynQueenne »

woolvalley wrote: post #278
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> It seems this discussion comes up fairly often, and the solution is almost always some variation of "make driving too expensive and/or too inconvenient, to force people to use public transit". It's more like the other way around: the idea is to make public transport cheap and efficient enough that it's a reasonable alternative to driving everywhere. >> For example I live in a very public transit friendly city, but…

It's probably because you have the NHS and socialized medicine, which would probably house the mentally ill homeless in some sort of mental hospital? I'm guessing the OP post lives in SF or maybe LA, where the mental hospitals were dismantled because of scandals in the 70s or 80s. There are 2 kinds of homeless, normal people down on their luck, and people who need psychiatric or addiction care. The normal people go u…

>> It's probably because you have the NHS and socialized medicine, which would probably house the mentally ill homeless in some sort of mental hospital?

Unfortunately not. Mental illness is rampant among the homeless population. And, to be honest, even the most "normal" people will develop mental illness once forced to live on the streets for long enough.

Generally regarding the NHS and mental health, the subject is very controversial. Resources are continuously slashed and the care available is not adequate, in many parts of the country.

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